1

Find your place in your profession

• Clarify the purposes of your position, your role, your duties.
• Define what room you have to maneuver.
• Clarify your tasks.
• Know the corporate culture and values.

2

Strengthening the assistant/manager synergy

• Defining what both are expected to do and contribute.
• Assessing your communication model.
• Adapting to your manager’s thought processes and leadership style.
• Establish a trusted relationship and knowing how to maintain it.
• Getting out of your comfort zone.
• Building your self-confidence. Using difficulties to go further.
• Self-affirming by being bold, by knowing how to speak up.

3

Improving Your Personal Organization

• Telling apart the urgent from the important: Prioritizing.
• Anticipating your manager’s needs.
• Managing emergencies, unforeseen circumstances, interruptions.
• Planning activities.
• Spotting time-consuming activities, knowing how to say no.
• Giving yourself permission.

4

Serving as a bridge

• Being the interface between internal and external clients/the manager.
• Knowing how to represent your manager: Reporting.
• Receiving, listening, and handling requests.
• Informing and getting informed.
• Writing an effective report.
• Developing your network.
• Adapting your communication: Who you’re communicating with, context.

5

Knowing how to communicate face-to-face

• Listening, being assertive, creating trust, speaking in public.
• Communicating on the telephone.
• Effectively producing a message: Question, rephrasing, summary.
• Arguing and persuading.
• Managing difficult people to deal with.

6

Build your action plan

• Defining actions, goals, deadlines.
• Setting measurement criteria and things to watch out for.